With the Premier unable to assume support for key bills from his own party shouldn't the United Bermuda Party be making more headway? Matthew Taylor talks to a former PLP leader and a former UBP leader and examines the ongoing malaise in the official Opposition.

Is the fiercest opposition to Premier Dr. Ewart Brown coming from his own backbenchers?

That is the question cynics are posing given the failure of the United Bermuda Party to build up a poll lead, despite the lamentable ratings for Dr. Brown.

Indeed throughout the PLP's decade in office polls invariably show the PLP scoring higher than the UBP, even if the PLP leader at the time isn't popular.

Mid-way through its third term in the political wilderness is the UBP seeing any signs of a breakthrough or is the party which ruled Bermuda for 30 years doomed to perpetual Opposition?

Former Progressive Labour Party Premier Alex Scott, who spent years on the Opposition benches in the Senate and House, said: "I don't see the UBP in terminal decline, I have been impressed with the growth of Kim Swan as Opposition leader.

"He was put in a difficult place at a difficult time. He is sorting himself out, it will be interesting to see what he brings to the party.

"They are at sixes and sevens, but so were we for a while when the UBP was in its heyday."

Now is the time for the Opposition to put the Government on the backfoot, said Mr. Scott.

"But they are not aggressive enough. That is lacking, they make a point here and there. The Westminster system requires a strong opposition."

He said the UBP needed a stronger PR machine to package their message. "But first they have to establish one, what are they about?

"What would they do differently and how would it better serve Bermuda? If that is lacking then Government would win by default."

Being the Opposition is hard without a bank of civil servants to draw on to shape policies and form arguments, said Mr. Scott.

"Now they have the reality of holding down a job and doing their politics also it's very tough financially.

"They have young folks with families and careers. They can't offer rewards of ministerial portfolios.

"But if the UBP had a cohesive programme of review and rebut and kept the Ministers pinned down they may cause supporters to say 'I see a future for the UBP, so maybe there is a future for me'.

"But that's not there, the political playing field is left for the PLP."

But Mr. Scott said the UBP was getting traction in some crucial areas.

"Kim Swan, I think, scores higher than Premier. That didn't used to happen."

Mr. Scott said all of the new UBP recruits had shown potential although he believes one of the most successful Opposition MPs is one of its old hands Louise Jackson.

"She is carrying out the role of an Opposition member almost to the letter.

"If the younger members took up their portfolios like she did they would give the PLP a run for their money.

"Therein lies the secret, she's established, she's retired and can put time to her politics."

With the UBP still struggling, is it only a matter of time before the party considers a leadership switch certainly that's been the form so far with five leaders in ten years.

But Mr. Scott said: "From him to who?"

Some in the party have openly called for the 'old guard' of MPs to step down but that could mean the party loses the valuable experience it needs to make its mark in Parliament and among the public.

Former Premier and Finance Minister David Saul said what the party needed was some new recruits but not necessarily at the expense of established MPs.

He said: "Some new blood would be help, some fresh faces but not necessarily young people.

"They need to get some experienced people."

Asked who they would replace, Mr. Saul said if the new people were talented enough others might step down.

"You don't have to line them up against the wall and shoot them."

But Mr. Saul conceded diverting attention from business and family to be slated in the media wasn't an attractive choice, but people did sometimes make that jump if they felt they could contribute to the country.

When Mr. Saul entered politics he had never before been to the UBP headquarters, but others urged him to stop complaining and get involved.

"I topped the polls, I was elected and the next day I was Minister of Finance, my maiden speech was the Budget. These things can happen if you keep the doors open."

He said a name change could also help boost the party among the public but the key was the personnel.

Former United Bermuda Party leader Wayne Furbert left the party in frustration over the pace of change and said the party was doomed to defeat unless it recognised the new political realities.

He said the formula of maximising the white vote and pulling in 25 percent of the blacks was doomed.

"Those days are gone, the white community is dying off, the black community is increasing but only ten to15 percent are supporting the UBP.

"What worked for years is not working anymore."

He said the PLP had 15 to 16 safe seats and so only needed to pick up three seats to win an election, whereas the UBP had less than ten safe seats and was losing ground in some, including Bob Richards' seat which shed 200 votes last time to become a marginal.

Mr. Furbert said reports that voters focus groups were saying the UBP was finished were just echoing the pattern he had seen when he was leader two years ago.

"The UBP needs to dissolve for the good of the country.

"Failing that they will be in the wilderness for many, many years to come."

Although the party only came six points behind the PLP at the last poll, Mr. Furbert says the gulf to winning is getting ever wider.

"The public are crying out for change.

"The UBP are not being effective as an opposition, people will never trust them to move on to become Government."

Mr. Furbert admitted white votes might be lost to the PLP if the UBP collapsed.

"But you might pick up some black votes.

"We are trying to create a better community with every ethnic group voting for the party they felt was best for the country."

But he conceded there were hardliners in the party and outside it tied to the party name.

"I think the UBP will stay as it is. The people who need to make a clear decision on what they need to do are people like John Barritt, Shawn Crockwell, Donte Hunt, Darius Tucker and Trevor Moniz these guys are a little more understanding of the situation.

"The need to make a move on going forward.

"They are hoping the PLP mess up so much that the UBP can slide in, that's the only strategy they have going forward."

'Reform won't work'

As a white businessman living in Paget 'Bob' would seem to fit the demographics of the archetypal UBP voter.

Yet the 37-year-old family man has only voted for that party once when he split his vote between the UBP and the PLP during the latter's 1998 landslide in the old dual-seat days.

Since then Bob (not his real name) has regularly spoiled his ballot paper in protest about two parties he heartily dislikes.

As for the UBP he believes it pays lip service to diversity.

Even though blacks are the majority in the Parliamentary UBP, Bob sees white politicians like former leaders Michael Dunkley and Grant Gibbons as still being in the driving seat, while blacks are largely given token positions.

Reform will never work, says Bob the UBP needs to completely disband.

Able to see talent on both sides of the political divide Bob wishes a new group can be formed. "I am looking for change."

But to work he believes it will need to be instigated by disenchanted community-rooted PLP MPs and augmented by similarly minded ex-UBP-ers, rather than the other way around.

"Otherwise it will just be seen as the UBP wearing different clothes."

Perhaps then the new entity can challenge a Government he sees hiding all too readily behind race.

He said: "I am frustrated with the political system. I hate the race card being pulled out all the time. It's not defensible to be asked what happened to this or that and just say 'that's racist for you to be asking that question'.

"To be honest with you I don't really care what colour you are, if lots of money is unaccounted for I would like to know what the answer is."

And amid the political malaise the public education system has nose-dived while crime is soaring, said Bob.

"We have a lot of stuff going on this island, it's more negative, I just wish they would start sorting out some of the violence and stop the wastefulness in Government.

"Back in my day I could go to any primary school and get a great education, same with the secondary schools.

"There is no guarantees of that for my children any more."

Time for UBP to go, says Christian Dunleavy

With his popular website Politics.bm Christian Dunleavy was for years a poster boy for pro-UBP polemic.

But struggling against the weight of history and current electoral boundaries the ex-blogger believes his former party can't win in the forseeable future and should pack it in.

Not to do so merely cedes power to a wasteful and incompetent Progressive Labour Party said Mr. Dunleavy.

"The best the UBP could perhaps hope for would be a complete meltdown of the PLP, resulting in them winning every UBP safe seat and every PLP marginal. But that would maybe get them to 19 seats.

"The electoral map is stacked against them and the popular vote.

"It's impossible to see how they get to a governing Parliamentary majority within a decade.

"The PLP would really have to hand them the gift of a spectacular implosion. But based on the level of public ambivalence to their current exploits I can't imagine what that would be."

The UBP should be more concerned with changing the political dynamic in Bermuda than their own party, said Mr. Dunleavy, who let his membership expire years ago.

For him Bermuda comes first and the UBP is unwittingly perpetuating a very corrosive political dynamic.

"Ewart Brown's act is tired and predictable, but it works.

"The UBP long ago lost the political argument by ceding their history to the PLP propagandists."

Ironically the success story that is Bermuda was built on the UBP's watch the infrastructure, the economy, the stability, said Mr. Dunleavy. "But they get vilified for it while the PLP bask in the glow of it. It's unfair, but that's the way it is."

So the only way to change the climate is for the UBP to remove themselves from the equation.

Bermuda can't afford the time it would take to remake the UBP, said Mr. Dunleavy.

He said the UBP had been proven right on the issues of the past decade squandered budget surpluses, the alienation of international business, the damage of term limits, escalating crime, education, health and seniors issues.

"But no-one's hearing them."

He said the UBP's existence is perpetuating a political dynamic that is an anachronism and a relic.

"Both current parties need to go away and the UBP should take the lead and disband. The PLP would have to also reinvent themselves and abandon their backwards-looking racially divisive politics.

"If not they'll fragment as true ideological alliances form."

Disbanding is a tricky political gambit, it's not unheard of but it's rarely seen in parties regularly commanding 47 percent of the popular vote.

Mr. Dunleavy suggested some or all MPs should abandon the party framework immediately with current MPs sitting as independents until the next election.

"Some would run again, others would retire and some would lose to be replaced by other candidates for some new entity. I don't think you can draw out a tidy roadmap for this. It will be messy, but that's OK."

Premier Brown might call a snap election, but that's irrelevant, said Mr. Dunleavy.

"It would be called out of weakness not strength."

A medium to long-term view is required said Mr. Dunleavy.

"I am sure that new coalitions are waiting to form. A new party or parties would emerge. We'd see some new faces who were previously unwilling to be a part of the tired and debilitating PLP v UBP game.

"We can't afford our best and brightest to sit on the sidelines out of despair or disgust."